Being Bee (6 page)

‘Everything is so expensive,' she said. ‘I can't believe it. I'll never find anywhere.'

‘Maybe you have to move to a slightly different area,' Dad said, patting her awkwardly. ‘I'm sure we can find somewhere, Jazzi.'

‘I was so happy there,' she sobbed. ‘I was just so happy.'

It sounded to me as though she didn't think she could ever be happy again. I'd only been to her flat a few times. It wasn't
child-friendly
so Jazzi tended to come to our place unless I stayed with Nanna or Uncle Rob and Aunty Maree. It didn't look unfriendly to me,
but it was pretty small and there were a lot of things in it. It wasn't a place you could stretch out in. Even the kitchen was tiny. If you had dinner there, you had to clear the table in Jazzi's study or else sit on the floor in the lounge room and eat from the coffee table, which I quite enjoyed doing. It was very Japanese. We'd learnt about that at school. Dad said it gave him cramp, though.

‘Maybe you can get somewhere bigger,' I said, trying to be helpful and positive. ‘You know, a proper place with a kitchen table. That would be good because then you could make stuff in the study and never have to clear it away.'

Jazzi made weird things. She called them dolls but some of them didn't have any faces and some were kind of spooky. Others didn't have any clothes on and their rude bits were showing. She gave me one, not one of the rude ones, but one of the faceless ones. I didn't like it and I kept it up on a shelf in my cupboard so I didn't have to look at it.

‘I'll never find anywhere bigger,' Jazzi sniffed snottily, ‘not for the kind of money I can afford. I'll end up living in a cupboard somewhere – horrible.'

I gave up then and stomped off to write a note to Fifi and Lulu. I knew it would take ages before Dad found it, but I didn't care. I had to complain to someone, so this is what I wrote:

Dear Lulu and Fifi

All she's done is cry all morning, and all Dad's done is pat her and kept looking for places to rent on the Net. I wanted pancakes but no one would go to the supermarket for eggs. There were ants in the jam. I don't see why our weekend has to be ruined because some old lady has died and Jazzi has to find another flat. And who heard of a grown-up crying over something like that. My mother wouldn't have. She was a positive person. Dad always says you shouldn't be negative, but he didn't say that to Jazzi. Not once.

Love

Bee

I left the letter in Lulu and Fifi's letterbox. There wasn't anything to do, so I made a few fairy houses down near the tree ferns and wondered if the fairies ever used my houses. Once Sally had come over and we'd both made one. It was still there. Sally had put a little pebble fence around it and we'd even made a fairy bird bath from an old shell. It was the best fairy house. The ones I made by myself didn't look half as good. I stuck a cockatoo feather in the front of one, but it looked too big and I thought it might scare the fairies away, so I put the feather in my ponytail instead. That made me an Indian so I whooped around for a while
and pretended to stalk some buffalo, but then Honey, the dog from next door, spotted me, so she stopped being a buffalo and I patted her tummy through the fence for a while. I thought about ringing Sally and seeing if she could come over and play, but then I remembered she wasn't talking to me.

It wasn't fair. No one was talking to me.

Inside the house, Dad and Jazzi were still hunched over the computer. Jazzi had the box of tissues on the arm of her chair. They were no longer looking at flats, though. There were all these figures on the screen and Dad was shaking his head at them in a sad kind of way.

‘So much for my Jazzi-free weekend,' I told him when he came to tuck me in that night.

‘Bee,' he said, sitting on the end of my bed, ‘I know you and Jazzi have had some differences but basically you'd say you both got along, wouldn't you? I know she's very fond of you.'

I shrugged.

‘Because I'm thinking of asking her if she'd like to move in with us.' Dad spoke very quickly as if he didn't want to give me a chance to say anything at all. ‘She hasn't any family, you know, and we get along so well. She's really enriched my life, sweetheart. I love her very much. No one, and I mean that, Bee, no one could ever replace your mother, and I don't expect you to think of Jazzi as your mother at all and Jazzi wouldn't either.
But I think we could all be very happy together.'

I wanted to tell him that Jazzi did have family, that Harley was her brother, but I couldn't work out what to say, so instead I said, ‘Well, that's just great. Now I'll never have any Jazzi-free time. It will always be you, her and me. What was wrong with the way it was?'

‘I was lonely,' Dad said, ‘and when I saw her that night at Trivia, I knew she was the most interesting woman in the room, but I thought she was bound to have a boyfriend. I was right about the first thing, but, fortunately for me, I was wrong about the second. I really want us all to live together, Bee. She's smart, she's pretty, she's creative and she makes me laugh. We need each other.'

‘What about me?'

‘Sweetheart, you're my best girl. You always will be. But you'll get older, and you'll move out and leave your poor old dad. You'll fall in love and marry someone and then where will I be?'

‘You could be like Stan. He's happy.'

‘Only because he lives next door to your Nanna!'

‘Why can't you and Jazzi live next door to each other then?'

‘Come on, Bee, look on the positive side. You'll have someone to take you clothes shopping, someone to teach you how to cook, and someone to do all those
girlie things with. You need someone like that.'

‘I don't care,' I said. ‘I don't care if she moves in or if she doesn't. I couldn't care less. I'm too tired.'

I rolled over and pretended to go to sleep. Dad stayed on the end of my bed for ages but he didn't say anything else and neither did I.

I didn't want to tell Sally and Lucy at school that Jazzi was going to be my stepmother, but Jazzi told them herself.

‘Well, here we are,' she said when she picked me up. ‘Hello, Sally, hello, Lucy. Has Beatrice told you the news?'

‘No,' Sally said, ‘
Beatrice
hasn't.'

‘I'm moving in with Nick, Beatrice's father, so the first thing we must do is to celebrate that by you girls coming over for a play as soon as I've settled in.'

‘Told you so,' Lucy hissed behind Jazzi's back.

‘We'll make cup-cakes,' Jazzi continued, ‘with pink icing.'

‘That would be lovely,' Sally said politely.

‘And you must call me Jazzi, just like Beatrice does. Now, if you could just introduce me to your mothers, I can get your phone numbers.'

She acted just like a real mother and I didn't like it but there was nothing I could do about it. She wrote their phone numbers down in her little pocket diary and discussed play dates with the other mothers.

The next day at school Sally said, ‘So she
is
your stepmother now.'

‘She's pretty cool,' Lucy said. ‘Cup-cakes sound good. Does she always make yummy things?'

‘Always,' I said, keeping my fingers crossed behind my back. ‘She makes scones practically every afternoon after school and we eat them with strawberry jam and cream. She's going to be a great step-mum.'

‘Every afternoon?' Lucy sounded wistful.

‘Nearly,' I said. ‘On Fridays she makes chocolate icecream with big lumps of real chocolate in it.'

‘She does not,' Sally said sharply. ‘No one makes icecream, you have to buy it.'

‘Jazzi makes it,' I said. ‘And sometimes it's even got marshmallows in it and hundreds and thousands sprinkled on top.'

Lucy and Sally looked at each other.

‘I think you're lying, Bee,' Sally said, ‘because you don't make ice-cream, you buy it, and anyway you told
me once ages ago that she didn't let you have anything unhealthy.'

‘That was before,' I said. ‘This is now.'

‘You're still lying.'

‘Am not.'

‘Her fingers are crossed,' Lucy said.

‘No, they aren't.' I waved my fingers in their faces. ‘See!'

‘They were, though, I saw them.'

‘You two are impossible,' I said and walked off to play Pick Up Papers. I was beginning to like Pick Up Papers.

At home, all that Dad and Jazzi talked about was The Big Day. Dad had decided to paint the lounge room just for Jazzi moving in, so we all looked at paint strips. I wanted Mountain Mist but they decided on Natural Linen.

‘What's the point of even painting it, if it's just going to be the same colour?' I asked, but they were too busy measuring a space to see if the fold-down desk Jazzi's mother had left her would fit between Dad's big bookcase and the fish tank.

‘I'd like my bedroom painted,' I said. ‘I could have Mountain Mist in my room. I'd like a purple room, particularly if I could have a new doona cover. I've had that Teddy Bear one ever since I can remember.'

‘I think my little quilt could go up on that wall. The colours would tone in nicely, don't you think, Nick?'

‘I think you know much more about that kind of thing than I do,' Dad said, putting his arm around her, ‘and I'm counting on you getting our house shipshape again.'

‘So painting my room would be a good thing,' I said, ‘in terms of the shipshapedness of everything.'

But they didn't hear me, or they weren't listening.

I cut the Mountain Mist square out from the paint strip and put it on the fridge with a note, ‘For Bee's room!', and wrote to the guinea pigs on the rest of the strip.

Dear Fifi and Lulu

It is all mad in the big house. You are lucky to be here in your own little cubby with no one moving in. In fact, you are lucky to be guinea pigs. If no one paints my room Mountain Mist, which is the colour I would really like it to be, can I come and live with both of you, please? I promise not to fuss or want to put anything big in too small a space.

Love

The girl who feeds you, Bee-the-best

The next morning I got a note back:

Dear Bee-the-best-girl

We both think Mountain Mist sounds like a very
romantic colour. Would you get sick of living in a romantic room, though? You could come and live with us, but Fifi has the left-hand side of our hutch and Lulu has the right, so you'd have to squeeze up between us. We'd all be very warm at night.

Love

Fifi and Lulu, the eaters

‘I wouldn't get sick of Mountain Mist,' I told Dad as he drove me to school. ‘Honest I wouldn't, Dad. It's the colour I really want my room.'

‘Bee, let me just get the lounge room painted first, okay? Then we can discuss your room. First things first. Jazzi has to move in and then we can assess what other changes need to be made.'

Jazzi didn't seem to have a first things first problem.

‘I'd like to have a dinner party, Nick darling,' she said, ‘to celebrate my move. Our move.'

‘Of course, darling. I think that's a great idea. But let's move first, shall we?'

‘I'd like Sam and Rowena to come, since they were responsible for us meeting, and Ro's been my best friend for ages, and I'd like your, you know, Lindy's brother and his wife – it sounds strange to say that. But I'd like us all to get along and I know how important they are in your life and we should meet. It's strange that we haven't, really. Patricia, of course, she'll have to come.'

‘Sure. But, sweetheart, I think we need to get you moved before we start planning dinner parties.'

‘Will I be there?'

‘Of course, Beatrice. You can help me with the preparations. You could ... let me see ... help choose the flowers.'

‘So it won't be a barbeque?'

‘I suppose we could have something on the back deck. Although there might be mozzies. Also, I think Patricia might prefer to be indoors.'

‘If you're going to invite Nanna, you'd better ask Stan as well.'

‘Of course,' Jazzi said.

‘And what about Harley?' I said. ‘You'll have to invite Harley.'

‘Who is Harley?' asked Dad.

I stared at Jazzi wildly, trying to say sorry without actually saying anything, but she wouldn't look at me.

‘So,' Dad said, looking from me to Jazzi, ‘who is Harley?'

‘Harley is my brother,' Jazzi whispered.

‘I'm sorry,' I said almost at the same time, ‘I didn't mean to tell. It just slipped out.'

‘Didn't mean to tell what, Bee?'

Dad's voice was his dangerously quiet one. It meant ‘Have a bath or else. Go to bed without arguing now. No, you cannot have any more ice-cream,
don't ask again.
'

‘Nothing,' I said.

‘Jazzi, can you explain this?'

‘Harley is my brother,' Jazzi whispered again. ‘He's not ... well. I didn't tell you. I didn't want you to think ... I should have said something. I'm sorry.'

‘He's really nice, Dad. Harley is really nice. You wouldn't know there was anything wrong with him, really.'

‘What exactly is wrong with Harley and why has Bee met this secret person but I haven't yet had the pleasure?'

‘He's not secret,' Jazzi said. ‘I just don't like to talk about him. But he's not secret. If you'd asked me, I would have told you.'

‘I'm sure I did ask if you had any brothers or sisters. I can remember asking, actually. I asked you in front of Rowena and Sam, the first night I met you.'

‘You asked Rowena and she said no. I didn't say anything.'

‘So your best friend doesn't know you have a brother?'

‘Not really.'

‘Not really?'

‘I think we should discuss this in private, Nick.'

They discussed it privately for a very long time. I watched three TV programs downstairs while they talked, and we got home-delivered pizza and I was
allowed to eat it in front of the TV which was very strange. They discussed it right up to my bedtime, when Dad stopped discussing long enough to tuck me in, but they were still deep in conversation when I wandered out hours later to get a drink of water.

The result of all the talk was that Harley was invited to the dinner party too. I was kind of pleased about that. I didn't think Harley should miss out. I thought about his tea bags and his sticky buns and I knew Harley would like to come to dinner.

Jazzi moved in on a Friday and by the following Monday her stuff had found its way into all of our cupboards and on to all of our shelves. Her pictures hung next to our tree fern and creek photos. In Dad's bedroom, her clothes hung next to his in the wardrobe. I crept down and looked. He'd crammed all his work clothes up one end while Jazzi's skirts and dresses rustled roomily at the other.

Only my room was a Jazzi-free zone, if you didn't count that doll, sitting with her face to the wall in my cupboard. I wrote to Fifi and Lulu:

Dear Fifi and Lulu

It's really scary, her stuff is everywhere. It's not that I don't like her stuff. She has much nicer mugs than we have. None of hers are chipped. She's got a plate I like, too, with chooks on it. They have bright
red tails and yellow beaks. She said I could use it anytime. But our lives have totally changed and Dad doesn't seem to know that. He just keeps looking at her with this dopey grin while she makes them both tea in her teapot. Dad used to have tea bags. Now we have tea in a pot and she'll teach me to make it. What's wrong with tea bags anyway? I don't get it.
Love
Bee (who feels mopey)

They wrote back:

Dear mopey Bee

In Japan they have a beautiful tea ceremony and they use cups that are so thin you can see the shadow of your fingers through them. Perhaps J. just enjoys pouring tea from a pot? All change is scary. Like when you bought us from the pet shop we thought anything could happen. Who was this girl? we thought. Will she eat us? we wondered. Will we be happy? we asked each other. But we are and you might be too. The chook plate sounds rather nice. Are chooks anything like us? Have you ever seen a guinea pig plate?

Love

Fifi and Lulu (who would like some more celery, please)